Just yesterday afternoon, I noticed that trees are budding, little fat nodules, little leaflets. This picture is of the hazel tree outside our living room window. A bush near the driveway is suddenly showing small yellow blossoms. A forsythia? Maybe, I'll have to look more closely. In the last few days the winter-shaded balcony is starting to get some morning sun on its outside edges. There are shadows! Driving to a friend's house last night, I noticed that there are a lot of flowering trees that have burst forth with bloom. Spring! 

At the friend's house, one of the topics we talked about was dreams. He's had very clear and meaningful dreams lately. I tried to pay attention to mine last night. One of them was about grass. A patch of it had grown too tall to mow, and I was going to have to use a weed-eater. That hasn't happened yet, but I'm sure it could! Maybe my subconscious is afraid of meadows? I have been considering meadow-ing the sloping lawn, but I wonder if I'd be tarred-and-feathered by the neighbors if I did? I think I'll see how it goes as a lawn for another few seasons before I get crazy and go shaggy.

The time changed, and we're slowly adjusting. Yesterday the cats let us sleep in to what had been the normal time. Today they cottoned onto the change, so we got up in the dark. Being retired makes the change a lot easier, but I still wish we could just leave the time alone...

It feels a little funny to be reporting on domestic luxuries when we've apparently started a war. We, I say, though it is certainly not my idea or choice. I hope for the best, though it's hard for me to figure out quite what that would be beyond a speedy halt to pretty much all of it. But there it is, and here I am.

Our fireplace inserts are in and functioning! I'm sitting by the upstairs one right now. They definitely put out the heat. We had to have them on full blast for awhile yesterday, to burn off the extra paint and oils and whatever horrible toxic things needed to be burned off. It stunk. And it got very, very warm in the house, even with all the doors open. Now that's done, and we just have to adjust to how to use them.

It was one of our first big projects here, and pretty invasive, with drilling into brick and concrete, and adjusting gas lines. There were big choices, it was expensive. It was stressful. And now it's done, and we are so glad.

This photo is by Mr Random, of Griffin enjoying the heat. 

This is the upstairs unit. 

We've (probably) missed most of the really cold days this winter, but it's still nice to have it done. We have heat now, even if the power goes out. We can warm our toes if it does get chilly. We can look at flames. Cheers!

Rain, rain, rain. Yesterday it didn't ever seem to stop. Friends reported over two and a half inches in their rain gauge. Another friend has a huge pool in the street in front of her house. We can see a pool in our downhill neighbor's yard. Wet! It's days like this when the exercise bike comes into its own. It doesn't get used a lot, but it's very nice to have it available when looking outside is nicer than being outside. 

We're having to wait for our fireplace insert installation. Too many people called in sick - they didn't have a crew to send. That was disappointing, but on the other hand, I don't want to get whatever they've got. If they're sick, staying away is okay. And in some ways, it was great not to have anybody here, just to do our own things without disruptions. We're rescheduled for Thursday (assuming everybody is better by then.) 

No real garden news to report. The bulbs on the hill are growing taller and greener, but there are no buds yet. One of the daffodils near the driveway has popped open. I imagined I saw buds on a couple of nearby trees, but on closer inspection, it turns out to be moss or lichen. So not yet. On my list of things to do for next year is to plant a couple patches of early bloomers for next year - some crocuses or something, I need something to look at. The one snow drop was great, but I want more. 

Yesterday we took the next step in our fireplace insert installation project. The first step took the longest - getting off our duffs and going down to look at the models in the store. Then then next step took a long time too - deciding which we wanted, and then getting up the gumption to pull the trigger. That was about a month ago. So now we have gas lines set up, and also the bottom plates on both fireplaces. They expected to have the units installed yesterday, too, but the three-guy crew was down by one who called in sick. So we have more to come on Monday. Then the inspection by the city needs to happen, then they can connect them to the gas line and we can start them up. No one is quite sure how long it will take to get an inspection. I'm hoping we can be sitting by our fires by next week-end, but I'm an optimist.

This is the drill bit they used to go from the upper side of the downstairs fireplace angling into the firebox of the upstairs fireplace. It took a few tries to get the right angle, and was really an incredibly awful noise that seemed to go on forever. I liked the sound of "Oops" and "Do you think we need a different angle?" even less. I wondered what had possessed us to cause us to destroy the place. Would the fireplaces crumble with all the drill holes snaking through them?  The cats were very much alarmed as well. But in the end it got done, and more neatly than I had envisioned.

Above is the hole downstairs,  near the ceiling, now with a gas pipe going into it. The pipe wraps around the chimney at ceiling level, then goes into the fireplaces from the far side, where we won't see them much.

And here's the hole in the upstairs fireplace, now with a pipe coming out of it from below. They tidied it all up and put a big metal plate in the bottoms of both fireplaces. I can't wait to see the units installed.  The gas pipes are fairly evident downstairs, but I'm guessing we'll stop seeing them soon enough. There is quite a lot of conduit for one thing or another running around the ceiling down there, exposed, so it's consistent with the rest. We may hang something over the most egregious spots, but it's not that bad. It's nice that there is really nothing visible upstairs at all - it's all coming from below.

So more of that to come. Meanwhile, some flowers! I have a couple daffodils starting to get ready to bloom outside, but nothing that I want to pick at this point, so I've been buying the occasional bunch at the grocery store. These were "happy Valentines day to me!" flowers.  It is a complete luxury, and I've been enjoying it so much.

And in other news, from another place, we weeded and planted potatoes at the Farm today. One of the farmers brought a couple of her grandkids, thus lowering the average farmer age by a lot. I had to share my weeding tool AND trade kneelers, since three-year-old helpers are pretty demanding little people, but I eventually got my tool back. 

Spring is getting closer!

Despite the advice to leave well enough alone, I felt the need to DO yesterday. I decided that the edging of the lawn by our front door, and the gravel around the slabs on the way to the front door should be clear of growth, so I crawled along and cleared it out. To get the look right, I need to do some edging as well, but I didn't because the cats really love to go out there and chew on the grass, and we all know who's in charge around here.

There were a lot of little things growing along here. I think it looks better. This can be the tamer side of the house, and the wilder side is uphill, on the other side. 

This is the first anniversary of my mastectomy surgery. A year ago, I was a groggy, injured mess, still in the hospital, with tubes and drains, and it had been snowing and there was ice everywhere. We lived in a different place. What a difference a year makes. What a lot of changes! I have done a lot of healing, though I still have some numbness on my upper arms and arm pits. I didn't anticipate the thick, leathery feeling of the scar tissue, either. Not that people didn't warn me that it might be like that, but I didn't or couldn't project how it was going to feel. It gets better as time goes on, though. Then my mom passed away. We bought a new house, moved, sold the old house. It's a new phase!

Speaking of phases, this came up on my FB feed yesterday. I had shoes like this in high school. I loved them. I'm happy to report that I'm not such a packrat that I still have them - I got rid of them long, long ago. I can't believe they're coming back. Somehow I can't see myself wearing these now, even if they are hip again. If they really are, and it's not just FB bullshitting me or targeting the over 60 crowd with retro shoes. Just no.

Griffie has a sunbeam today. He's been enjoying the low winter sun when it shines in. We have some today! It's been rainy, foggy, and dim for the last few days so it's nice to see a bit of brightness.

It's getting harder not to go out and start tidying up outside. I want to fiddle out there, even though I know it's best for the bugs, critters, and beds if I don't rake, prune, or stomp. (I make an exception for blackberries - they're on my list..) In the book I've been reading, slow chapter at a time, since it's that kind of book, Ben Dark's The Grove: A Nature Odyssey in 19 1/2 Front Gardens, I came across a page that had been folded down. On that page, two points he made hit me.

• "'Don't interfere with the roses' should be printed on the handle of every pair of secateurs, just as 'Smoking causes cancer' is on a packet of tobacco. We are detrimentally obsessed with rose pruning." I think he's right. In our old yard, there were three roses. The one I left to its own devices was by far the healthiest and the most beautiful. And, yes, out of control, but there's the control freak talking.
• "The need to do causes more damage to gardens than benign neglect ever has."  What I want to do is all kinds of tidying, clipping, cleaning. What I need to do is wait and watch, and let things develop so that I know what is really there. Patience is the thing. And being happy to just go out and look at things without picking at them. Probably part of my challenge is settling on what kind of look I want. The urge to weed, to control, is an urge for a more traditional look, sort of suburban, and in keeping with many of the yards around here. If I want a more natural look, and there are yards around with that aesthetic as well, I need to be more open to what happens to grow, to serendipity. And apparently I haven't figured that out yet. Maybe I'll end up with areas of each.

I did sign up for an event in March, Native Plants in your Garden, a Workshop by Coast to Cascades Bird Alliance: Habitat Haven. I think that a more habitat friendly area is what I want, and the benign neglect this place has had in the last few years has probably edged it into that direction. Maybe this will give me some ideas and impetus. And a leg to stand on in support of the idea of not being as tidy and maintained as some.

If laziness/lack of action is intentional and necessary for the goal, is it still laziness? A point to ponder.

Friday we went out to the Fern Ridge Wildlife area and walked through the emptied reservoir. I love how big, wide, and empty it looks. It's not quite as big as it looks here, or as empty, but it's a great way to get into a very different landscape without going very far. 

Yesterday, we had pounding rain, almost all day. I enjoyed it - I did some sorting, rearranging, and put a few more things into the charity basket. We do not need more than twenty liqueur glasses. We probably don't need twenty, but you know, baby steps. This seems like the sort of thing I might have done before or during our move, but I think they were small enough that I just boxed them. There are a few other things that I think I brought, but I don't know where they are. Maybe I didn't? Things got a bit on the fraught side, moving, so I'm not sure that all the decisions I made were good ones. Oh well. Things will turn up, or maybe they won't. Maybe I will have to replace a thing or two. Or not. 

Yesterday was a very much stay-inside kind of day, but I'm starting to consider the spring and summer, and how we'll want to use outside spaces. Last summer we didn't spend a ton of time outside. We were too busy moving in. And too thrilled with having actual air conditioning! I think it will be different this year. I'm considering getting a grill. I've never liked lighting the fires - charcoal or the little Coleman stove we had. There's something ridiculously intimidating about that. Time to overcome it. Maybe this year, for once, I'll actually use some of the grilling recipes that come out in every magazine and online all summer long. I've ignored them for a long time... and doing that outside has some appeal. This house has a great kitchen, but it has a really lousy over-the-stove vent. I made hamburgers (a nod to the super bowl) last night, and set off all the smoke alarms. I didn't even burn anything - it was just barely darkened! Sigh. There's always something that needs to be improved. 

Speaking of fire, we have a date for our fireplace inserts being installed. Friday, February 20 is the day they'll start. My sense of the process is that they'll put them in and get the gas lines ready to go, then we call the city for an inspection. After the inspection, they'll come back and do the final steps. Since the work starts on Friday, I expect it will be the next week before we can actually use them. Still, it's great to have it on the calendar.

We've had some really warm days this week, in the 60s, and probably warmer in the sun. I did some gardening/yard maintenance - weeding, a bit of mowing, some blackberry detering, and then sat on the deck in the sun with Fleur for awhile, looking at a catalog and reading a book about gardens, by Ben Dark, called "The Grove.". It's funny, a good British gardener yarning away about his neighborhood gardens, Parks, and plants. The chapter I turned to was really appropriate, titled "Camellias", since I had just discovered one up on the hill above the deck, with a nice bloom. Only the one so far, but I'll keep my eye on it. 

Earlier, we ate our lunches on the balcony. That was a bit cold and dank, not totally pleasant, since it's on the north side of the house, and very shady, but we needed to prove that we are not assholes. The backstory of that is a friend who commented that people who have balconies and don't use them are assholes. We keep that in mind.

I made an attempt to bring a cutting from the Cecile Brunner rose that was so huge and stunning in our old back yard. It didn't look like it did anything, but in the throes of moving, I jammed the twigs that had been soaking and doing (apparently) nothing in a pot, and plopped it down in a handy spot out by the driveway. And look - leaves! It's alive! Now I'll have to figure out where to put it.

Soon there will be daffodils. We'll see if the deer eat them or not. My Osso Berry tree-starts are beginning to leaf out - will the deer chew them to nubs, or will they make it? We'll see. No real sign of leafing yet on the dogwood or the ninebark starts, but I think they may leaf later. I hope so, anyway.  Many of the rhododendrons seem to be getting ready to flower. I'm really looking forward to seeing what the color scheme is!  

Today is my paternal grandmother's birthday. Happy birthday, Nonny! I woke up the other night trying to remember her brother's name, my great uncle. I racked my brain, and finally found a record of him online because I remembered his wife's name. His name was Charles, but they called him Bill. I don't know why - his middle name wasn't William or Bill. I met him once or twice when I was a child, but he showed up a lot in my grandmother's stories. One of the legends was that he was still carrying a piece of shrapnel in his lung from the war that they never got out. Turns out he was a February baby too. I didn't know that. 

It's going to be another sunny afternoon - we've broken out of the fog. It was very thick this morning. And I have a newly emptied lawn debris container to fill. Fun stuff!